Return
by Phoenix Boy
Summary: When Ryoma comes back to Japan after a pro career, it's to send his son to Seigaku.  In the end, there is something waiting for him as well


When it was announced that he would be attending Seigaku junior high in Japan, Ryuu was mildly concerned but not surprised. It would be strange not to have his grandparents only a few minutes walk away. His father, although frequently away for tournaments, had been held up for years as a shining example of a single parent but still struggled with a few basics. Cooking, for one. Ryuu could foresee a lot of rice and takeaway meals in the coming months. Still, his father occasionally got misty-eyed (metaphorically speaking) as he reminisced about Japanese tennis in his own junior high days, so it couldn't be all bad. After all, it produced the first two members of what looked like an Echizen dynasty sweeping international tennis. Well, sweeping it until they got bored – Nanjiroh at twenty, Ryoma at twenty eight, having topped the world rankings for ten continuous years.

They arrived mid-afternoon a week or so before the school year began. Long enough, in his grandmother's words, to get over the jet-lag and long enough, in his grandfather's words, to scout out all the decent courts. Deposited in the street by the taxi, they looked at the house.

"Well, it looks okay," his father said at last. Even from the outside the differences from houses in New York were immediately apparent, the nameplate proudly displayed by the gate being one of them. "At any rate, the garden is big enough for a tennis court and we're only five minutes walk from the street courts. Fuji says they're much improved since I was last here; I might go thrash a few people later."

"Che," Ryuu said and walked past him up to the house, tennis bag on his shoulder, it being one of the few things not shipped over earlier.

"Mada mada," his father said smirking, as he is forced to stop at the locked door. As they moved into the house, he put their bags down and started to unpack. "I asked Fuji-senpai to pick up some food for us – so long as you watch out for anything not pre-packaged, you could get yourself a snack and then sort your room."

Ryuu winced at the reminder of the time he stole some of Fuji-jisan's lunch that time he'd been commissioned to photograph the US Open for Tennis Pro Monthly. He'd felt like he'd lost layers of his tongue. There probably hadn't been anyone else his father had kept in touch with well enough to ask or else he'd never have trusted Fuji. Probably not, anyway.

In the end, there wasn't much that needed doing. After years of following his father to tournaments, Ryuu had much less by way of clutter than most kids his age. It didn't seem necessary really to carry around more than a bare minimum of clothes and his tennis things.

Even so, it was early evening before he headed out, intending to find the street courts. There probably wouldn't be anyone interesting there – there rarely was in such informal places as top players would have scheduled training to attend – but his father still had some work to do before they had a court and after the long flight he was itching to play a match.

After asking directions only a couple of times, Ryuu made it to the courts and stopped halfway down the steps in surprise. He'd been expecting two, maybe four at most, rundown courts in a deserted corner of the park. In fact there was a block of eight courts, all occupied by a variety of singles and doubles matches. They weren't on at the time but there were spotlights ready by each of the courts and seating at each end. It was possible that his father was right about Japanese tennis.

As he moved into the area where people were spectating, he unconsciously pulled his cap lower over his eyes. He seemed to be one of the youngest there. Most of the players were boys, though there was an enthusiastic game of ladies' doubles happening on one of the nearer courts, and they seemed to range from about his own age right up to guys who were probably older than his father.

He moved over to get a good look at the games. The standard was mixed but there was one court of older guys at the far end who looked quite competent for amateurs.

"Yo, is it your first time here?"

The speaker was a slender teenager probably a couple of years older than him. Ryuu looked him over appraisingly: his racket was good, the grip tape looked like it would need replacing soon, the clothes were nice but not flashy.

"Aa."

"Now we have eight courts, we play one set matches. The end court over there is for warming up. Once a game finishes, the court is open for anyone but generally the people who've been waiting the longest go on."

"Simple enough."

"Since you're new, someone will probably challenge you to a game soon to see where you stand. You're fairly young to be coming here, which school are you at?"

"Seishun Gakuen, as of next term."

"A good choice. A word of advice: stay down this end of the courts – most of the guys here are either at Seigaku or were in the past. The far end is all Hyotei and they can get . . . nasty on occasion."

He fell silent and Ryuu took the opportunity to look down towards the end the other boy had labelled Seigaku. None of the boys seemed to be wearing team kits, which was probably why he hadn't noticed before, maybe because it was the holidays. The exception was the group of men that he had noticed before. There were six of them there – two playing a singles game and the rest sitting on the bench by the court, in the shade of the trees behind them. As he watched, one of them stood up and walked over to speak with a boy closer to Ryuu's age. The boy bowed slightly and wandered around the courts towards him.

"Evening, Sato-senpai," he said before turning to Ryuu. "Hi, I'm Tanaka Yusuke. Do you want a game? The game on court 7 is just about to finish."

"Sure."

Ryuu deposited his bag on the bench by the court and began stretching while the match currently playing drew to a conclusion. That done, he pulled out a racket and prepared to play. After a short rally to warm up, they met at the net.

"Which?" Tanaka asked, lowering the head of his racket to the ground.

"Rough."

"Rough it is. Your serve."

Ryuu took the ball handed to him and moved back to the base line. From what Sato said, this match would determine his initial ranking at the street court, so he had to play fairly seriously. His opponent was right-handed, so he squeezed the ball in his left hand, threw it and hit a twist serve.

Tanaka dodged the ball headed for his face and looked over with a great deal more interest. There were murmurs already starting around the court.

"Was that a counter-revolution serve?"  
"That kid can't be more than twelve!"

He smirked and served a second ace.

By the fourth serve, his opponent worked out the timing and managed to return the ball. Not bad, for someone facing it for the first time but a quick return and he took the game.

Through the next few games, it became apparent that while this boy was good he wasn't up to Ryuu's standard and he took the set 6-2.

Now comfortably warmed up, Ryuu joined Sato again at the side of the courts.

"Well played," the older boy said but he didn't sound overly impressed.

"Che, he's still mada mada dane."

To his surprise, a return came straight back at him.

"Not really. Tanaka-kun is a doubles specialist; you're clearly a singles player. It's a different game. Momo-sensei gave you an opponent who's a good tennis player but only a decent singles player."

"Sensei?"

"Aa. The tall guy just going on court there on court 4 in the old style Seigaku jersey. He coaches our junior high team."

By silent consensus, they moved along to watch court 4. Both players were much stronger than anyone else Ryuu had seen so far. If Momo-san could coach as well as he played, it would be an interesting year.

"Enjoying yourself, Ryuu-kun?"

"Fuji-jisan," he acknowledged. To his surprise, Fuji was wearing the same style jacket as the others on this court.

"I'm a little late tonight. I called by your house on my way down; your dad says he'll be along later. The courts are good, ne?"

"Not bad."  
Fuji smiled at him.

"Excuse me, Ryuu-kun, Sato-kun."

With that, he ambled past them to slip into the group around the court as if he had been there all along.

"So how do you know Fuji-san?" Sato asked curiously.

"He's a friend of my father's. You?"

"Everyone knows him around here; he's something of a legend. It's rare to see him play seriously but when he does . . . That's really something to watch."

"Aa." Ryuu knew exactly what he meant. He'd seen Fuji play his father once or twice and he was easily good enough to have gone pro, though not good enough to beat his father. As a technician, he was perfect. It was the sort of tennis that anyone would enjoy watching.

After a bit, Sato was called off to join a doubles match and Ryuu continued to watch Fuji's court. The singles game had finished and Fuji was warming up with one of the other players, a southpaw this time. They ran through their strokes with the ease of long familiarity and when Fuji bowed out smiling, the court cleared. Before he knew it, the other man had come over to where Ryuu is standing. He looked down at him appraisingly; the sharp eyes seemed unimpressed by his previous display.

"Echizen-kun, play a match with me."

Ryuu's eyes widened slightly. Who was this guy? Okay, so maybe he did look quite like his father but why was he making a point of noticing it? Still, he'd do for an opponent.

He shrugged and moved past the man towards the vacant court, racket resting nonchalantly on his shoulder. If he was offended, the man gave no sign. One of the other men took a position by the net to umpire.

"A one set match. You can serve."

Ryuu took the ball, surprised. It was usually an advantage to serve first. The fact that he'd been given it so easily either meant that this guy was hugely confident in his own skills or that he'd severely underestimated Ryuu. It was normally the second: he'd lost track of the number of adults who'd had some idea of 'going easy on him'.

"Echizen-Tezuka, one set match. Echizen to serve."

Switching his racket to his marginally weaker left hand, Ryuu sent his twist serve flying at the opponent. Tezuka smashed it straight down the line. He didn't even have a chance to move and stared after it in disbelief. True, the twist wasn't unreturnable, but hardly anyone could return it that easily. Had he played against a counter-revolution serve before?

"Come, Echizen," Tezuka said, already in position for the next serve. Ryuu blinked and moved across.

A crowd had already started to gather around the court.

"This brings back memories, ne Oishi?" Fuji said, smiling as they moved forward to where they could get a good view, the others around the court parting to let them through. "It will be interesting to see how Ryuu-kun is doing."

"I'm just concerned that Tezuka is planning on treating this Echizen as he treated Ryoma. Their first match was an overwhelming defeat and Tezuka didn't even need the Zone."

"The situation is much the same," Momo said thoughtfully. "Ryuu's probably been taught in much the same way as Ryoma was, so he's probably at a similar stage. That's what his game looks like, anyway."

"And Tezuka, of course, is much stronger than he was in middle school. The game that will be really interesting is Tezuka against Echizen Ryoma," Inui, said, eyes fixed on the court as he started a new page of his notebook. "It will be interesting to see if Tezuka can still hold his own."

"Honestly Inui, have you ever seen Tezuka flattened?" Kikumaru said. "Ochibi's not bad but Tezuka's still improved. When did he last lose? That match against Fujiko, what, five years back?"

"I believe it was the Yukimura game four years ago this September - Tezuka having won the succeeding three matches. Still, I wouldn't worry about it. A match against Tezuka isn't something Ryoma's ever been able to resist."

On court, Ryuu finally reached the return and was rewarded with a curt nod as the man sent it whizzing across to the opposite corner, beyond what he could reach.

"Heh, not bad," Ryuu conceded. So the guy could return a twist serve, that didn't mean much. Still, he would have to start playing seriously. He switched his racket into his right hand. Murmurs began around the court.

"Isn't the kid a southpaw?"

"Does he think that changing hands will help him beat Tezuka? He'll have to come up with something a bit better than that."

Fuji-jisan and his friends didn't even blink. Maybe Fuji had mentioned it or maybe they were all aware of his relation to Echizen Ryoma, who was well known to switch hands depending on the way the game was going.

"Love-40," the referee announced. "Tezuka leads."

Ryuu served a fast slice serve straight down the centre, catching the edge of the box. In terms of accuracy it was textbook perfect. His opponent didn't seem to have realised that he was supposed to struggle to return such a serve and, as Ryuu had half expected, returned the ball easily. This time, though, he was already moving.

"A one-footed split step," came the prompt comment from one of Fuji's friends. "Interesting, it seems that Echizen Ryuu's development is currently a couple of months ahead of what I had predicted."

Ryuu could feel a smirk spreading across his face: it was always nice to have a knowledgeable audience. It usually took people a lot longer to notice that his split step was a bit different from the norm. With it, he was finding that Tezuka's shots were more easily reachable.

He skidded forward to return a low volley with a Drive B, one of his father's signature moves and usually a safe winner against most opponents Ryuu had played. What he didn't expect was for Tezuka to move precisely to smash it backwards. That took incredible judgement of the speed and spin on the ball.

"Game Tezuka. Tezuka leads, one game to love. Change courts."

Ryuu moved around the court more thoughtfully. This guy wasn't just an average court's local ace, he was genuinely good. Other than his father, no one had broken him in a love game in years. He'd have to pick up his pace if he wanted to win this.

He wasn't prepared for the serve that whistled straight past his ear as he stood, rooted to the ground. That serve felt as fast as his dads, maybe even faster! Tezuka was already on the other side as he prepared to serve again. Ryuu narrowed his eyes, readying himself to move. This one he caught, though only enough for a weak return which was neatly put away.

"That won't be enough to beat me," Tezuka said, face completely serious. "Show me _your_ tennis: Echizen Ryuu's tennis, not Echizen Ryoma's."

Ryuu scowled at him. His dad's tennis was good enough to win a Grand Slam, why shouldn't he use it? And who was this guy to tell him?

"I'm not going to let it end like this, you know," he said, determined to at least take a game.

His next return was particularly vicious and followed up by a perfect drop volley. Tezuka almost seemed to smile as he stepped forward to take it early on his backhand. Sensing the drop shot coming, Ryuu dove for the net, ready for the bounce. Instead he stared, sprawled across the court, as the ball landed, spun in place and then rolled back into the net.

"Zero shiki drop," Ryuu said ruefully. He could never have anticipated that: even his dad couldn't hit that one perfectly and it was always obvious when he was about to try.

"A zero-shiki," came the murmurs from around the court. "Tezuka's taking the kid seriously."

Fifteen minutes later had him on his knees, sweat pouring down his face, as the score was called

"Game and set Tezuka. Tezuka wins, six games to love."

Tezuka looked at him, face still inscrutable.

"You will never be able to perform to your potential until you overcome that barrier. You have the talent, though. I want you to become Seigaku's pillar of support this season," he said and walked back over to his bench.

Ryuu struggled to his feet and found Fuji waiting for him at the edge of the court with a towel and a bottle of water.

"Thanks, oji-san."

"You played well."

"Hardly."

"There aren't many opponents that can make Tezuka show all of his skill. I haven't beaten him in five years now."

"Oyaji could beat him, no problem," Ryuu said, depressed at the thought. Someday he was going to beat him but at the moment that day seemed a long way away.

"I'm not so sure."

Ryuu stared at him.

"What?"

"Ryoma sails through most matches without thinking much about it. Since I met him, he's only ever lost seven people. Of those, there are only three he's lost to more than once. One of those is your grandfather and another is Yukimura-san, who was captain at Rikkai Dai for five years straight. Ryoma spent the best part of three years going to Kanagawa every weekend to pester him or Sanada-san for a game."

"Oyaji doesn't like losing. He has a reputation to maintain. He'll be down soon, I guess."  
"Didn't you notice? He arrived during the fourth game of your match."

"I embarrassed him too much for him to come over, I guess."

"I wouldn't say that. Look."

Ryuu looked to where Fuji indicated. His father was in fact there, walking across the courts towards them, racket bag over his shoulder and hands in his pockets. He didn't look disappointed, more like he was building up towards a good match. As he passed them, he lifted Ryuu's cap onto his own head and ruffled his hair.

"Not bad, kiddo, for a first match and now buchou is all mine."

Tezuka turned as Ryoma came up behind him. Ryuu stared, mouth agape, as Ryoma bowed to the other man.

"Buchou."

"Ryoma-kun."  
"It's been a while."

"Aa."

"I'm back for a while now - Ryuu's going to Seigaku."

"Fuji said. He's playing well."

"Still mada mada dane."

"No more than you were at that age."

Ryoma's mouth quirked up.

"Fancy a match, buchou? Unless you're feeling old, of course. Ryuu might have worn you out."

Tezuka gave him a hard look and Ryoma grinned unrepentantly at him.

"You're the one who's retired, as I remember it," Tezuka said pointedly, already moving back towards the court. "I assume you'll need to warm up."

"Aa."

Ryuu stared at them.

"Oyaji is actually acting respectfully," he said then thought back. "Well, sort of. So who is this Tezuka guy, anyway?"

"Tezuka Kunimitsu, thirteen times winner of the Japan senior amateur singles tournament: he lost four years ago to Yukimura and six years ago to Atobe. He was at Seigaku with me, Captain of tennis team the year we won the Nationals. Ryoma was a freshman that year and hero-worshipped Tezuka, to a certain extent."

"Oyaji?"

"Mm. Tezuka was the first opponent he met who beat him other than Echizen Nanjiroh. You might say that Nanjiroh gave him the physical skills and Tezuka the mental. At any rate, Tezuka won the last time they played."

"Is he better than you?"

"They both are. I can push them to tiebreak sometimes but I haven't beaten either in years."

"Seigaku's really that strong? I thought oyaji was exaggerating again."

"Our team was. The current team, I couldn't say. Momo - Momoshiro-sensei to you - thinks that they have the potential to make it. You'll probably make regulars, I'd guess as Singles 3."

Singles 3: hardly glorious. Still it was a start and it sounded like he'd have the opportunity to beat a whole load of good opponents. On the court, his dad had clearly decided that he'd warmed up enough - he'd probably jogged down here so it wouldn't take much - and the match was starting.

"If Tezuka's that good, why didn't he go pro?" Ryuu asked after a moment. Fuji himself was easily good enough to be a professional and if Tezuka was better . . .

"Injury problems. He injured his left elbow freshman year of middle school and his left shoulder in his third year. With extensive therapy they healed well enough for three set matches but five long sets is too risky, so he wouldn't ever have been able to play the big tournaments."

"Oh," Ryuu said, not sure how to reply so he turned to watch the game.

The crowd for this match was much bigger than that for Ryuu's match. Maybe some of them had recognised the slender figure of a tennis pro who'd retired four years previously or maybe they just noticed Tezuka's interest in him. A crowd of men and boys of varying ages from the far end of the courts walked up together wearing blue and grey jackets, presumably an old Hyotei team as Tezuka and Fuji belonged to an old Seigaku team. Ryoma spotted one of them as he walked back to the base line and smirked from under his cap.

"Monkey King, you haven't changed much."

"You haven't changed at all, brat. It will be nice to see you lose again."

If Ryuu had thought that his father's game with Fuji was the perfect game of tennis watch, this was the same amount above it that that was above a normal game. Actually, the game seemed to be at an even higher level than the Wimbledon final that his father had played in a few years back, supposedly the height of achievement.

The two of them seemed evenly matched, trading smash for smash as Tezuka broke all of Ryoma's drive volleys and Ryoma caught the zero-shiki before it landed, sending it back with a grin of delight.

It was during the third game, the two of them standing at one game all, that Ryuu noticed something strange. Tezuka's movements across the court were getting less and less.

"Fuji-jisan, Tezuka isn't moving!"

"Tezuka Zone. Look, Ryoma's noticed though. It'll be interesting how he decides to deal with it."

It took another game until the ball Ryoma struck flew straight, not curving towards his opponent. Ryoma was smirking broadly and even Tezuka seemed to be smiling slightly as he moved to return it.

"Game Echizen. Tezuka leads three games to two."

After that, the two of them seemed to force each other to greater and greater heights.

"Muga no Kyouchi," Fuji murmured under his breath as the two of them went into the tiebreak, staring at them intensely. "They've gone this far at the street courts. This year's tournament is going to be incredible."

When they finished at last, there was complete silence on the courts for what seemed like a whole minute before the applause started. Teenagers were talking enthusiastically about the techniques and about the players. The man from Hyotei just smiled, nodded and headed back across the courts with a smug smile. Ryuu could see his dad challenging him sometime just to wipe the look off his face.

Both of the players were smiling as they sat silently next to each other on the bench, Ryoma reaching over casually to steal Tezuka's towel. Tezuka raised an eyebrow at that then shook his head with long-practised patience.

"Momoshiro, Kaidoh, you mentioned something about your new formation," he said at last, turning to his team. "You can play the Golden Pair."

As they moved onto the court, Fuji sat down on Tezuka's other side.

"It's nice to have everyone back together," he said.

"Aa," Tezuka agreed, reclaiming his towel and Ryoma's water bottle with it. "We're having sushi at Kawamura's tonight."

"But I just bought food for them," Fuji protested with mock indignation.

"Che," Ryoma said. "That's why we need to go out."


End file.
